Help with making a slalom course

[igkya]

I plan on installing a semi-permanent floating course on a public lake this year (install in Spring, take out in Fall). Need some advice on the following:

How much weight for each anchor?
pros/cons of poly mainline vs. steel cable
Recommedations on size of PVC pipe (sched. 40) & how have you connected these?

[LT206]

From experience - buy a course offered by companies like EZ slalom or Instaslalom. I would not recommend making it yourself.
My brother and I made one - but it is a lot of work to set up and take down. Our homemade course doesn't take long to put in - maybe 30 -45 minutes, but we end up spending another 2 or 3 hours getting it to float level by adding weights and floatation in different spots. It is infuriating trying to ski on a course this is out of tolerance because it won't float right. We're probably going to by one from EZ slalom this year. www.ez-slalom.com

If you want to make it yourself - EZ slalom has plans that come with a material list, other companies may have that too. For me the few extra dollars spent to get one that will work out of the box without a bunch of tweaking is money well spent.

Oh, and we used a poly mainline with ours and that part of it has worked fine, however, we never leave it in for more than a week at a time. When I order our new one, I'll get the poly mainline, I don't think the stainless is needed unless you plan on leaving it in permanently, plus the poly mainline costs much less.

[MARK-S]

Make sure to go with a stainless steel line. You can go with poly from the ends of the course to the anchors. I put a car engine block mounted on rebar on 1 end and an old 200lb water pump attached to rebar also. We were 15ft deep on 1 end and 7 on the other. depending on the type of bottom, you may need more or less. We just pulled our balls at the end of the season and left the PVC and line on the bottom. Hook it with an anchor in the spring and attach the balls. We put sub floats along our pipes to keep them level in the water. Install the course, and then make periodic snorkels along each pipe to make sure there is no sag. Pm me for any details I can give you.

[M3Fan]

I definately second EZ-slalom. I've worked with the instaslalom product before and EZ-Slalom puts together a much nicer product. Plus, Ed's a great guy. The slalom course is one of the best skiing purchases I've ever made.

[Fredk]

EZ slalom works great! A friend of ours has had one permantly installed in a lake for 4 years now with no problems. He simply pulls the bouys at the end of the season and lets the course sink, then in spring dives down, pulls an end up and starts attaching bouys. We have the course marked on a GPS to make it easy to find. His has a poly mainline which has held up well, but plans on switching to stainless to reduce the stretch. As for anchors, he made concrete blocks with large eyebolts embedded. They weigh about 75# each.

[east tx skier]

From experience - buy a course offered by companies like EZ slalom or Instaslalom. I would not recommend making it yourself.
My brother and I made one - but it is a lot of work to set up and take down. Our homemade course doesn't take long to put in - maybe 30 -45 minutes, but we end up spending another 2 or 3 hours getting it to float level by adding weights and floatation in different spots. It is infuriating trying to ski on a course this is out of tolerance because it won't float right. We're probably going to by one from EZ slalom this year. www.ez-slalom.com

If you want to make it yourself - EZ slalom has plans that come with a material list, other companies may have that too. For me the few extra dollars spent to get one that will work out of the box without a bunch of tweaking is money well spent.

Went through the same thing. It costs a little less to make your own, but the learning curve eats up valuable time. I built an individually anchored course with buoys that clip on to the subs. Takes about an hour for one person to swim the buoys out. Locating them involves using rope with measured sections on it. As water level fluctuates, the buoy lines had to be adjusted.

After the water level in our cove got increasingly low for the last two years, I bought an ez slalom course from Ed last year. He is great with customer service and has a great product.

As for weight, that depends largely on what type of bottom your lake has. We had a muddy bottom and could get away with one cinder block per buoy. The space in the blocks made for great suction when you sank them down. We've measured several times since and they haven't moved.

As for tension weights, I hear old engine blocks work great for mainline courses. For something that will be in for months at a time, I'd go with a SS mainline.